


a little curse never hurt anyone

by giidas



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Curses, Happy Ending, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Harry coming to terms with his inevitable death, Introspection, M/M, Mutual Pining, Oblivious Harry, Pining, Post-Hogwarts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-15
Updated: 2020-02-21
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:02:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22741438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/giidas/pseuds/giidas
Summary: A Wasting Curse, considered by many as an honorary member of the Unforgivable Family, is the last thing Harry expects to be hit with on his way home from work. But hit with one he is.Thankfully, Harry has been coming to terms with his mortality for two decades now, ever since that walk in the forest, so having an actual countdown to when he bites the bullet, so to say, is not as bad as it might seem.Or so he's trying to tell himself.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 57
Kudos: 480





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks go to Zandra and Mar for encouraging this, wouldn't have happened without them!
> 
> Beta by my dear Monika, thank you always.
> 
> one of the possible titles was "i can be cursed a little, as a treat"

Harry groans before even opening his eyes. St Mungo’s, he thinks bitterly. His hand goes to his chest, pressing into a spot just below his breastbone. He doesn’t need yet another scar, but judging by the lack of bandages, the spell probably didn’t injure him. At least not in an immediately visible way that would require fixing and would leave a mark.

He sighs and opens his eyes.

He’s unsurprised to find his room empty.

The dot that speeds around the face of the clock on the wall makes him uncomfortable, as it always has. It’s distracting and emits a low hum of a noise which makes Harry’s skin itch. It’s quarter past two, middle of the night. He’s been out of it for at least six hours then. Harry lets his head fall back down on the very much not fluffy pillow. 

The door to his room opens and in comes a familiar looking face.

“Oliver?” Harry ventures.

“Hello, Mr Potter,” Oliver says with a frown, “I thought you and your healer agreed last time that you won’t be visiting us for at least a year.” He raises his eyebrows at Harry and with a wave of his wand, produces Harry’s chart.

“Yeah, well,” Harry flounders for something to say, clears his throat, “at least this time there wasn’t any blood?”

If possible, Oliver raises his eyebrows even further. “And how would you know that, Mr Potter?”

“Er.”

“That’s what I thought.” He checks the floating chart once more, casts a couple of diagnostic spells and proceeds to fill Harry in on the time he lost.

Brought in unconscious by an Auror who happened upon him, lying motionless in an alley a five minute walk from The Ministry, by pure chance. His wand was still holstered. The Auror was unable to wake Harry using some of the spells from their mandated rudimentary healer training, and alerted the mediwizards who were on scene in under a minute of having received her call. Mediwizards deemed him safe enough to be transported and he is now in the Spell Damage ward, room 425, in the care of Healer Elmris. 

“She wanted to see what you’ll remember when you woke up,” Oliver concludes, “but had to unfortunately go home at midnight. She should be back in the morning and will give you more details about your condition once she has a chance to speak to you properly.”

“Ah,” Harry says. So he won’t be allowed to leave until then. He sighs.

“And don’t you even think about escaping. I am on Potterwatch and I will not have it, do you hear me, Mr Potter?” Oliver looks very stern, very serious, but it’s all for naught. Harry’s known him since he was a nurse in training, a nervous young boy trying not to show that he is meeting _Harry Potter_ for the very first time. Still, Harry schools his features, hopes he looks chastised.

“Of course, nurse Staghart.”

Oliver rolls his eyes and waves his wand again, a quill suddenly at the ready next to the floating chart.

“Your vitals are good, nothing seems to be out of order. How do you feel? Any pain? Numbness? Tingling?” 

Harry takes stock of his body. He feels as he always does. Like his bones are getting heavier each day, his muscles less and less willing to take on any strain. He feels what he always imagined Dumbledore must have felt like. Dumbledore, who he thought was at least two hundred years old. And here is Harry, thirty five and ready to retire and sleep for at least a decade. He shuts his eyes and takes a deep breath.

His eyes fly open when he feels an unfamiliar tightness in his chest, right under the spot his hand gravitated towards when he woke up.

Oliver narrows his eyes.

Shite, Harry thinks.

“No pain, no numbness, no tingling, just-” he thinks about the feeling and tries to put it into words “-pressure right here, when I breathe in deeply.”

The quill is scribbling furiously and Oliver steps forward, wand pointed at Harry, brow furrowed in concentration. His eyes narrow even more at the results, which Harry, no matter how many times he’s been laid down in St Mungo’s, still cannot read. They always look pretty though, a swirl of vibrant colours floating above his chest.

“Hmm, yes, I see,” he says, and checks back with the chart. “Yes, this matches Healer Elmris’ theory,” but he frowns when he says it.

“So, not good news then, I gather?” 

“Well, that very much depends, Mr Potter,” Oliver says and flicks the quill out of existence, the chart disappearing right along with it.

“On?” Harry can’t help but ask.

“On,” Oliver says, exasperated, “further examination by Healer Elmris.” He shoots Harry a look. “You very well know that I cannot be guessing at a diagnosis, Mr Potter.”

Harry does indeed know, and raises his hands placatingly. 

“Of course, Oliver, thank you anyway.” He smiles and Oliver relaxes. “How’s Nel?”

Oliver lets out a breath and drops his Nurse persona, his whole face melting, a sweet smile on his lips. “He’s wonderful, Harry,” he says, and his cheeks turn pink.

“Have you asked him y-” Oliver’s eyes go wide and he shakes his head wildly.

“Shh!” he hisses at Harry, looking around like he expects Nel to pop up from behind the potted plant in the corner. “The walls have ears here!” Oliver stage whispers.

“Not literally, I would hope,” Harry says after his chuckles subside.

Oliver rolls his eyes. “You and your dad jokes.”

Harry raises his eyebrows. Oliver looks at him and sighs, sitting down on the edge of the bed. His fingers pluck at the seam of his trousers, tugging at a loose thread.

“So you haven’t, yet,” Harry surmises and Oliver shakes his head. “Why?”

“Dunno.”

“Uh huh,” Harry says doubtfully and sits up, his joints creaking and popping as he arranges himself. “Sure you don’t.”

Oliver rolls his eyes. “Is this how you interrogate suspects?” He deflates though, and finally looks up at Harry. “I don’t think he--” he’s interrupted by his alert bracelet vibrating and flashing. Code violet, looks like. Oliver is on his feet and dashing out of the door before Harry manages to tell him to go and do his job.

Harry lies back down, noticing once more the unfamiliar tightness behind his breastbone, wondering if this is yet another new normal he should be getting used to. His fingers stray to it, covering the spot, and Harry closes his eyes.

* 。 • ˚ ˚ ˛ ˚ ˛ • 。* 。° 。* 。 • ˚

Harry wakes up to the noise of a beak clicking aggressively against a window followed by disgruntled hooting. A very familiar owl is hopping on the small ledge of his window, looking very undignified and very angry about it.

“Hi, Beaste,” Harry murmurs after he pops the window open enough for the owl to hop in. Beaste fluffs her feathers, looks up at Harry and pushes her leg out. Harry carefully unfurls the scroll that’s attached to it and is not surprised to see Beaste settle down, her yellow sharp eyes trained on him.

_Potter,_

_As there was no news about your untimely demise in today’s papers, I assume you have overslept or missed our meeting for a different, no less frivolous reason._

_Contact Margaret, once you are available, to reschedule._

_DM_

Harry sighs and looks at Beaste.

“Was he very angry?” he asks her. 

Beaste hoots softly and blinks twice. 

Harry makes a face. And then he looks back at Beaste. “How did you find me, anyway?”

Unsurprisingly, Beaste does not answer him, but does tilt her head and extend her leg.

“Of course, just a moment,” Harry tells her and grabs his wand, spelling his reply on a freshly transfigured piece of parchment.

_Malfoy,_

_Apologies. Will get in touch with Margaret by EOD._

_HP_

He knows Malfoy hates abbreviations, especially when the message is not even hand written. He can imagine his face; lips a tight line, brow slightly furrowed, nose scrunched up. It makes him chuckle just a little bit. He looks at Beaste and gently attaches the message to her leg. She doesn’t immediately fly away.

“Ah,” Harry says, “sorry Beaste, I don’t think I have any treats on me,” he tells her. Beaste draws her head back, and if she didn’t always look alarmed, Harry would say she was just that now. He smiles at her, petting her wing. “I’ll get you something special for next time, hm?”

She looks mollified, and hoots twice in a goodbye.

Harry settles back in the bed and wonders why Elmris hasn’t been to see him yet. His meeting with Malfoy was scheduled for 8 o’clock, surely she should have been by.

The tightness in his chest makes itself known and Harry tries to figure out if Oliver’s shift is over. He could try and escape during shift change, that’s how he managed last-

“Potter,” Elmris announces, bursting through the door like she’s in a hurry to escape the corridor.

“Healer Elmris, good morning,” Harry greets, smile on his lips. He likes Elmris, her no nonsense approach, the way she treats him like any other bloke. She’s straightforward, doesn’t beat around the bush.

“Is it?” she asks him, one eyebrow raised, as she looks over his chart.

“Erm,” Harry hesitates, “I mean…”

“I see nurse Staghart has been monitoring you, good, good,” she flips some more and frowns, “lie down, Potter.”

Harry does as she says, and there are diagnostic spells being thrown his way almost immediately.

Elmris makes faces and notes things in his chart. She waves it away with a flick of her wand once she’s done, and sits in the chair by his bed. She looks at him for a second.

“Any change in what you’ve told Staghart? Any pain, and so on?” she asks.

Harry takes stock of his body once more. Everything’s the same, the tightness still there, maybe even more pronounced than before. Harry tells her as much.

“And do you remember anything from the attack?” she presses on.

“I remember walking home,” Harry tells her, and rolls his eyes at her wide eyed expression, “I don’t live that far and it gives me some time to unwind,” he explains. She still looks dubious but Harry continues. “I don’t remember anything unusual. I did have my headphones on, but my proximity charm didn’t alert me to a malicious presence anywhere near me. I remember walking, and then waking up here,” Harry tells her truthfully, shrugs his shoulders when Elmris makes an unhappy face at him. “Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize, Potter, it’s not like you cursed yourself,” she waves his apology away and then sighs. “Potter,” she pauses and looks at him, “you’ve been hit with a variation of the Wasting Curse.”

The silence that follows is absolute. It might be the first time Harry can’t even hear the annoying clock.

Wasting Curse.

Well, bollocks.

He’s staring through Elmris and she must notice, because she moves and waits for him to refocus.

“Harry,” she says, her voice unusually soft, “do you--”

“What underclass?” Harry jumps in, can’t stomach the gentleness in her voice, the way her eyes look at him, full of pity. She clears her throat.

“As far as we can tell, it’s the love underclass,” she makes a face, “and most probably in the Honest family.”

Harry wracks his brain, but there are so many variations of the Wasting Curse, and the love underclass could fill a book on its own. He sighs, presses his thumb and forefinger into his eyes, pushing his glasses onto his forehead.

“I assume you’ve looked it up recently,” he says, “would you mind refreshing my memory.”

“The Honest Love Wasting Curse,” she pauses, clasps her hands together and leaves them on her thighs. Harry focuses on her fingers instead of her face. “Is lifted when a person loves you. If they love you honestly.” Her voice is steady, without infliction. She doesn’t say anything more. Harry looks up at her, raises his eyebrows.

“Okay?” he prompts. Elmris lets out a loud breath.

“From what we’ve managed to find out in the archives, someone has to love you, heart and soul, the way you are. Not an _idea_ of you, not some twisted version of who they _think_ you are. They have to love you, the _real_ you, the ugly and ridiculous and gross and wonderful and beautiful and anything in between parts of you.”

“Wow, you should’ve been a poet, Agatha,” Harry tells her.

“Stop it, Harry,” she chides, expression clouding over.

“You just basically told me I have to find my soulmate or I’m going to waste away,” he says, eyebrows raised, “I’m dealing the best I know how.”

“It’s not a Soulmate variant and you better be glad, that one is even more complicated,” she shoots back. Her knuckles are white. Harry makes a fist, looks at the white scar on his hand. There’s a burn on his finger. He doesn’t remember getting it.

“How long,” he asks her, voice low.

“I don’t know.”

“Best guess, then.”

“A month, six weeks, judging by the spread of it from when you came in, Oliver’s notes and my own check just now.”

“Shite.” Four to six weeks.

“You will come in every morning for us to monitor the progress--” Harry snorts “-- you will, Harry!”

“I will come in tomorrow morning, in under 24 hours, and you can judge the growth based on that. I will then come no more than once a week.”

Agatha looks pissed off, more than the time Harry Disapparated without letting her set his broken arm. She doesn’t explode, doesn’t shout. She closes her eyes, takes a deep breath. Lets it slowly out. When she opens them, her expression is neutral once more.

“I will show you the diagnostic spell. You will perform it on yourself every 12 hours and report the data to my office via floo or owl. You will come in, in person, once a week. Agreeable?”

“Thank you, Agatha,” Harry says, infuses the words with feeling. He is grateful for her, he truly is. She understands that he can’t-- that it’s not-- he shakes his head. She just understands.

“Does Oliver know the final diagnosis?” he thinks to ask.

She sighs, probably knowing where he’s going with this line of questioning. “He knows it’s a variation of the Wasting Curse, he doesn’t know the underclass.” To her credit, she waits for him to continue, doesn’t protest before hearing him out.

“I would like for it to stay that way.” Agatha’s lips are a thin line on her face, but she nods. “If you could also make sure -- I know you always do, but, please -- that my file is completely confidential, that there will be no leaks,” he looks at her, has no idea what his face is doing. He can barely feel it. He tries to focus on Agatha, on the feeling of his wand in his fingers.

“Of course,” Agatha assures him, voice once more neutral, “unless you explicitly permit it, your file and your full diagnosis will stay between us only. I am your assigned Healer and get alerted if you are being treated by Mediwizards,” she raises her eyebrows as if to say _as I did yesterday, thanks evermuchso,_ “meaning your treatment should not be compromised. I will alert you if I plan on leaving the country.”

That is their standing arrangement and Harry is glad this wonderful diagnosis did not sway her, did not make her argue with him about his decision to keep his treatments as secret as possible.

“Every twelve hours, floo or owl, check up in person every week. Thank you, Healer Elmris,” Harry says and forces himself to make eye-contact. Agatha nods, straightens her robes.

“Mr Potter, you are hereby released,” she disappears his chart and Harry knows it’s going directly to her very well warded filing cabinet, one that she has in her private residence. Only the most rudimentary copy stays at St Mungo’s. 

She turns away from him and walks out of the room.

Harry closes his eyes, takes a couple of deep breaths and goes to change from the standard Mungo robe he’s wearing.

A note on the diagnostic spell he needs to run appears on the nightstand not a minute later and Harry pockets it before Disapparating. 

* 。 • ˚ ˚ ˛ ˚ ˛ • 。* 。° 。* 。 • ˚

His office is Malfoyless when he appears there a moment later. There is a to go cup of tea with a warming charm on it and a note that says _you owe me a Galeon._ Harry smiles at it and shakes his head.

His door flies open, the doorknob knocking into the wall, startling awake some of the people in the paintings on his walls.

“Harry!” Ruth exclaims. She looks like someone dragged her through a bush, eyes wide, cheeks blotchy, hair a halo around her face.

“Ruth, what happened to you?” 

“What happened to _me?”_ she asks, incredulous. “Berry reported she found you in an alley, unconscious, and brought you to St Mungo’s, and you ask what happened to _me?”_

He forgot about the Auror who found him. Harry wants to curse himself. So much for trying to keep his visit to St Mungo’s a secret. He schools his expression and looks at Ruth.

“Yes, Ruth, I asked and I expect an answer.” He is well aware he’s not being fair, but Ruth has been with him for two years now and knows how he is about his health. She might not forgive him right away, but a bottle of good red from the Grimmauld cellar for her to enjoy with her wife will surely help.

Ruth glares at him but stands up straight.

“You have missed your meeting with Department Head Malfoy,” she tells him, tone matter of fact, “Berry did her best to spread the news about you far and wide but I have managed to keep it contained to our department only. I would expect a face to face meeting with Berry will help.”

“Thank you, Ruth, please see if Berry is available now,” Harry sighs, looks at the pile of memos on his desk. “Has the news,” he makes a face, “reached the Minister yet?”

“It has not and if all goes according to plan, it will not, Sir.”

“Oh Ruth, come off it, please.”

“Not an owl! Not a word, not even a Patronus!” she hisses. “You know very well that St Mungo’s will not tell anyone anything when it comes to you being there!”

He can feel his temper, knows that if they continue along this vein, it will get ugly.

“Ruth, we have had this conversation before. I will not explain myself again.” He knows his tone is clipped, sharp, but Ruth doesn’t cower, doesn’t back away. He’s glad he has her, glad she has his back. “I apologize for not sending word, but I was… Incapacitated for most of my time at St Mungo’s.”

Ruth’s carefully calm and stoic facade breaks. “I-- are you--?”

“Yes, everything’s alright, you don’t have to worry about me,” he smiles, wonders when it happened, when he started to be able to lie so very well. He doesn’t look at his hand. 

Ruth looks a little dubious but nods, just once, and points to the pile of memos. “I’ve taken the liberty to reply to the urgent messages, please see sent memos on the left. Non-urgent correspondence is as always, on the right, sorted by importance. I will fetch Berry, be right back.”

She doesn’t wait for Harry’s response.

Harry sits down heavily, putting one hand over his eyes and the other over the tightness behind his breastbone.

Berry comes in a couple of minutes later and their meeting lasts not much longer than that. She understands the need for confidentiality and apologizes profusely for telling the others. She explains that she was trying to find out if he was alright, hoping that someone else might know something. Harry watches her face carefully and decides to believe her. He sends her off and scribbles down a quick department-wide memo. 

At moments like these, Harry is very glad the whole Ministry has been overhauled after the War. He cannot imagine rising through the ranks and replacing Robards, being freshly thirty and having more than a hundred people reporting to him. There’s barely twenty Aurors at the Ministry itself nowadays, a much more manageable number. And the monthly meetings with the Head Aurors from offices all over aren’t as bad as they used to be either. The pastries are always--

His door flies open once again, startling Harry out of his reverie.

“Potter.” Malfoy strides in and Harry can just see Ruth standing behind him, arms spread wide, expression incredulous. 

“Malfoy,” Harry greets back, and some of his tiredness seeps into his tone because Malfoy stops dead, narrows his eyes and flicks his wand, shutting the door behind himself.

“Beaste found you at Mungo’s,” he says, eyes narrowing even more as he looks at what is visible of Harry from behind his desk.

Harry looks, too. Malfoy forgot his robes in his office, it seems, as he’s only wearing a dark shirt and a pair of very nicely cut trousers. Harry takes off his glasses, covers his eyes with a hand. He takes a deep breath.

Malfoy remains quiet.

“I’m not hearing a question,” Harry says, and looks up. Malfoy’s face is a white blob. Harry can barely tell where his eyes and mouth are. His eyes water from the effort of trying to focus on him. He puts his glasses back on.

“That’s because there wasn’t one,” Malfoy tells him once Harry’s glasses are back on his face. Harry raises his eyebrows at him.

Malfoy raises his right back. Then he looks to Harry’s right, sighs, and flicks his wand gently.

“You owe me that galeon even if you don’t drink the tea, Potter, I hope you are aware,” Malfoy informs him. Harry just looks at him some more and presses his palms against the paper cup of the newly reheated tea. Malfoy rolls his eyes and turns his back to Harry.

“Weasley can’t make lunch today, but Granger has been looking forward to it for hours now, so you better make time,” he tells Harry and leaves without waiting for a response.

“It’s Granger-Weasley,” Harry says to the empty room with a small small smile on his lips.

  
  


* 。 • ˚ ˚ ˛ ˚ ˛ • 。* 。° 。* 。 • ˚

  
  


The morning, or what little is left of it, passes quickly. Harry tries not to focus on the tightness, the pressure behind his breastbone. He knows no potion or spell can help alleviate the feeling The Curse brings with it, knows that it’s the nature of it, to make the victim aware of what is happening, slowly but surely.

Harry thinks about the walk to the Forest, about the leaves and twigs crunching under his feet. The Forest is dark and quiet, and something in Harry settles. He can’t help but think of Hermione and that one Mind Healer he had the courage to talk to after the War. They both told him that his coping mechanisms are fucked up. Of course, the healer didn’t use those words, but he might as well have. Harry is very much aware that using a memory of what amounts to a walk to his death as a means of calming himself is not ideal or standard, but it works. It works every time and Harry has accepted the fact that no one might ever understand that one.

A memo slams into his forehead, the paper crumpling.

_Lunch,_ it says. No signature, but he’d recognize that handwriting anywhere.

Harry stays mostly quiet during lunch, focusing on the food and on the verbal match happening between Malfoy and Hermione. He stopped registering the words they’re saying a couple of minutes ago, and is instead watching their body language, their expressions. 

It took years, almost a decade really, to get to this point, to get to where they are all mostly comfortable around each other. He’s glad for it, glad that when really given the chance, most if not all could acknowledge that their views were extremist, that isolationism was not the way to go, not for any society and especially not for one dwindling as fast as the wizarding one was. They still sometimes discuss it, the rise of extremism, the way an entire generation of young wizards and witches was fed these ideas, was bred to be soldiers in a war they were too young to fight. Today is not that day, though, thankfully.

Harry finishes his food and settles the cheque before Malfoy or Hermione can start their usual debate about it. He doesn’t really want to go back into the office and the pile of memos on his desk but he also doesn’t feel like joining in on whatever it is the two of them are discussing.

“What do you think, Harry?” Hermione asks.

“Sorry, ‘Mione, wasn’t really listening,” he tells her ruefully.

She smiles. “Of course you weren’t, you always zone out when we’re discussing new legislation,” she raises her eyebrows just so, “but I was asking if we’re ready to leave.”

“Oh,” Harry looks at their plates only to find them gone, “right.”

He glances at Malfoy whose brow is furrowed slightly. His eyes are a little darker than usual, Harry thinks nonsensically.

Malfoy holds out Hermione’s coat and Harry puts his own on in the meantime, trying not to let his eyes linger on Malfoy’s long fingers, on the way he deftly fixes the collar of Hermione’s coat. 

When they get outside, Malfoy looks at him once more, brow still furrowed, eyes searching. Harry looks away.

“Shall we walk?” Malfoy suggests, to Harry’s surprise, “I think we would all benefit from a bit of fresh air.”

Hermione nods and they start their slow trek to the office.

A little ways from the Ministry, Hermione bumps Harry’s shoulder with her own. Harry is startled awake once more, focusing on her instead of on Malfoy’s back, on his measured and elegant gait.

“Are you alright, Harry?” Hermione asks him, keeping her voice low.

Harry looks at her and is hit with such a strong wave of gratitude that he thinks he won’t be able to contain it. He’s grateful he met her, that they’re friends, that they survived all that they have, together. Grateful that he got to be at her wedding to Ron, that he got to meet their two wonderful children. If he has four to six weeks to live, he’s glad he will get to see her almost every day, if only for a half hour lunch break.

Harry knocks his shoulder against hers, and the smile on his face is genuine this time. “Just a little tired, that’s all,” he tells her, because it’s true enough. Because he can lie to others, but rarely can he outright lie to her or Ron.

“Okay,” she says, squeezing her fingers around his wrist once, twice, then let's go.

She’s the first to leave their little group and head for her office. Harry hugs her, even though he rarely goes for such public displays at the Ministry, even though he can tell he’s out of practice. Hermione doesn’t flinch away, accepts the embrace for what it is, squeezes her arms around him so hard Harry can barely breathe.

“Say hi to Ron and the brats, yeah?” he whispers into her hair.

“Of course.”

When he lets her go, she turns around and disappears down a corridor lined with dark doors.

Malfoy doesn’t comment, just continues on the rest of the route they share in silence. Harry expects some jibe about the hug as they part, but none comes. Malfoy just looks at him some more with that strange expression and wishes him a good day.

Ruth nods her head in greeting and informs him she will take her lunch now. Harry nods and collapses into his chair. How he’s supposed to stay in the office and at least pretend that he’s working for another four hours is beyond him.

He draws a deep breath and the pressure he feels is immediate.

Harry freezes, thinking back to lunch.

He doesn’t remember breathing especially deeply, but he now realizes that he could not feel the pressure at all. His brain is jumping to all kinds of conclusions and he consciously stops it. Agatha is an amazing healer, her qualifications are next to none.

Still.

Harry submits a request for a list of all the volumes the Auror department currently has on loan from the Ministry library. If he’s lucky, there will be at least three books on the Wasting Curse already signed out and he won’t be required to use his name to request them personally. 

An hour later he gets back a very comprehensive list, with around fifteen volumes marked in deep red, thirteen in slightly less alarming shade of red, and the rest in black, informing him that his department has been hoarding those twenty eight volumes very much past the time they are allowed to.

Harry rolls his eyes when he sees that Mouseley has kept all the books about Wasting Curses that he got from the library more than four months ago. He will have to have a talk with him about it later, but for now, he summons them and sends a note to be found in their place. Mouseley is the type to freak out if the books went missing without a sign.

With six thick volumes on his desk, Harry wonders if he should just grab them and go home for the day. He remembers the promise he made to Malfoy, about letting Margaret know about the rescheduled meeting by the end of day. He knows he has nothing on his agenda for tomorrow, and sends a note stating just that.

Ruth doesn’t even bat an eye when he tells her he’s leaving for the day, and Harry vows to send that bottle of red as soon as possible.

Books secured in his satchel, Harry Apparates home.

  
  


* 。 • ˚ ˚ ˛ ˚ ˛ • 。* 。° 。* 。 • ˚

  
  


He sets a timer as soon as he appears in his living room; Agatha would not tolerate tardiness and Harry doesn’t want to be the target of her ire. He opens the book about Wasting Curses, one that appears to have centuries of information on it as well as some case studies, or so Mouseley’s notes say. Harry spells it to read itself and for the illustrations to jump out of the book and replay as short clips. He still can’t believe Hermione never told him about this spell when they were at Hogwarts. Thank Merlin she took mercy on him a couple of years ago when he complained about the frankly insane number of files he is supposed to read and sign off on. Like this, he can at least go make dinner. 

He putters around the kitchen for a minute and settles on a simple sandwich and a fresh cup of tea. While waiting for the water to boil, he axes the spell and casts a different one, deciding he doesn’t have the time to read all of the volumes fully if he wants to manage before he actually croaks. He listens to summaries of the next two chapters, pours the water in his favorite mug. His sandwich assembled itself in the meantime and he spells it to follow him, his book and the mug of tea back into the living room.

The first book doesn’t really tell him anything he doesn’t already know. Wasting Curses are many and varied, and the case studies illustrate that the caster’s strength and intent influence the speed at which the Curse takes effect. The slowest recorder Wasting Curse took seventeen years to kill the Cursed wizard, the fastest one mere hours.

The book also repeats one more detail Harry was also very much aware of. Not even the caster can reverse a Wasting Curse. One either fulfils the conditions of the Curse, at which point it will dissipate without fanfare, or one dies a slow, not quite pleasant death. 

He’s gone through three more books when his timer runs out. He casts the diagnostic spell as per the instructions from Agatha, scribbles the details on a piece of paper and sends it through the floo.

He sighs at the book that is focused on the love underclass, allowing his head to fall back when he realized there is really no point in him even listening to this. There is no cure. Either you fulfil the curse’s conditions or you die. Him attempting to pull a Hermione will not change that.

He slumps down and can’t help but wonder how normal people react to this sort of news. He survived so many situations that should have killed him. He’s The Boy Who Lived. _Twice,_ even, which is a fact only a selected few actually know. He’s been living on borrowed time his entire life, feeling like he cheated Death at every turn. He’s always felt like Death was keeping an eye on him, ever since he was its Master for that little bit of time in the Forest.

Its watchful eye making sure Harry is aware of his mortality, no matter how many times he has escaped its clutches. He hopes Death is aware the tricks were not devised by him, that there was more at play each time, that he was a pawn at best. Death must be aware, otherwise Harry doesn’t think he would have made it this far.

Harry sighs and looks at the books. He banishes them all, hoping Mouseley will forgive him for returning them straight to the Library.

There’s nothing for it.

Harry will live his life as he did before Agatha shared the news, before his walk from work somehow ended up with him getting cursed.

He’s penned down a Will right after The Battle, before the trials even, before the last of Voldemort’s supporters were even caught. His solicitor does find it quite strange that Harry insists on updating it every year, especially since most of the information in it does not change. Still, it means more money into his pocket, so he never actually complains.

With his mind made up, Harry decides it’s time to get some sleep.

  
  


* 。 • ˚ ˚ ˛ ˚ ˛ • 。* 。° 。* 。 • ˚

  
  


After his check up, and some worried looks from Agatha, Harry walks to work. The tightness in his chest seems to be growing tendrils that are attaching themselves to Harry’s ribs, pulling at them painfully. Agatha frowned when he described that particular feeling, telling him to keep notes on any changes on top of the twice daily reports he sends in. Every curse has a different progression, she told him, be it the speed with which it takes effect or the amount of pain the person afflicted is under. He could have six weeks to live but only one or two of them could be comfortable ones where he gets to enjoy life as he did before. 

He tries not to think about that as he walks through the deserted streets, a chill in the air that wakes him up better than any tea or coffee ever could. He grabs a cup of both anyway, thinking he might as well.

Margaret is not in yet, but the light is on in Malfoy’s office, so Harry goes in without knocking, kicking the door open with his foot. Malfoy doesn’t even startle.

“Thank you,” he says while reaching out a hand and not looking up from a report that’s being furiously scribbled on with a quill.

“For what?” Harry asks, sipping from his coffee.

Malfoy does look at him then, one pale eyebrow already raised. When Harry proceeds to not hand Malfoy his cup, he rolls his eyes and wandlessly summons the tea from Harry’s hand.

“You’re in early.”

Harry hums, taking another sip.

Malfoy sighs, stops the quill and sits back, hands clasped on his stomach.

“Out with it, Potter.”

“Out with what?”

“Ruth might think she contained what happened to just the Auror department, but she wasn’t quite that successful,” Malfoy tells him, looking at Harry steadily. Shite, Harry thinks, shite, but Malfoy waves a hand before the panic can spread into his veins, his bones. “I took care of the rest and ensured there will be no more leaks.”

Oh, Harry thinks. “Thank you,” he says, genuine gratitude making his voice soft and quiet. Malfoy waves him away and keeps watching, eyes searching Harry’s face.

“I’m fine, it was really nothing,” Harry feels compelled to tell him, playing with the cup he’s holding, running his thumb around the moving logo.

“If you’re sure.”

“Yes, I-” Harry expels a breath, looking up, making eye contact, “-thank you, for your concern, really, but uh, yeah, I’m fine.” He knows he’s fidgeting, but then-- he fidgets often, it is not necessarily a sign that he is lying, and Harry hopes Malfoy somehow knows that. He doesn’t look convinced, but he does let it go.

They spend the next thirty minutes going over the plans for their project. It took a while for Malfoy to sell him on the idea of Aurors cooperating with some of the diplomats and lawmakers from the IMC, as they have been two separate organizations since the dawn of time, or so Harry’s been told. But after hearing Malfoy talk about some issues and then looking pointedly at Harry, mentioning how much Auror support, or more specifically, Senior Auror knowledge and expertise, would have helped here or there, he agreed to sit down with him.

The Ministry has been changed so much since the war that it only made sense to continue in the transformation, Harry thinks. Aurors in the original sense of the word are barely needed anymore, now called in for especially serious crimes instead of dealing purely with Dark Magic and Dark Artifacts. Depending on what the analysis of both domestic and international crime data will yield, his little department might be splitting into two.

Malfoy is efficient, which Harry’s grown to appreciate, and tells him exactly what he’ll need from him when they see each other tomorrow. Harry raises his eyebrows at that.

“No lunch today?”

Malfoy looks at him a little strangely. And then Harry remembers what day it is. 

“Right, of course, sorry,” he fumbles, because this is something they Do Not Talk About.

Malfoy visits his mother in St Mungo’s every Wednesday, and also on the weekends, or so Harry thinks. And then Harry thinks about four to six weeks, about quality of life, and he looks up at Malfoy.

“Have a good visit with your mum,” he says, keeping his voice gentle.

Malfoy looks startled, eyes wide and light and so beautiful Harry’s heart thumps unevenly for a couple of beats.

“I- thank you,” he says, composing himself, his face once again almost unreadable.

“Right,” Harry says, playing with the empty cup, “I’ll be off, then.”

Malfoy nods and opens his door with a wave of his wand.

Margaret raises both her eyebrows when Harry bids her good morning.

“I thought I scheduled the meeting for after lunch, Harry.” Her eyes look too knowing for Harry’s liking, as if they are both in on a secret or sharing an inside joke. Ever since her second week as Malfoy’s assistant, she’s always looked at him that way and Harry just hopes she is the only one who finds him this easy to read.

“We’ve settled everything for today.”

“I’m sure you have.”

“Bye, Margaret.” Harry tells her, heading to his own office to hopefully beat Ruth there. It is barely half past seven, so he might just make it.

He doesn’t.

Ruth sits him down to get him up to date on all the things he missed yesterday and he’s glad for it. His morning passes by in a blur of signing off on requisitions, reading progress reports on open cases and looking over all the documentation for a case that closed last week to make sure everything is in order and ready to be handed over to Hermione’s people. He’s about to pass the file over to Ruth when he notices Hermione in the doorway.

“Hey, ‘Mione,” Harry smiles up at her and points to the file, “got the file we discussed on Monday ready, Ruth will file it after lunch.”

Ruth waves at Hermione and spells all the files and papers to assemble themselves,bringing them over to her desk.

“Are you okay with going to the canteen today?” Hermione asks and Harry notices she looks a little worse for the wear.

“Of course.”

“Great. It’s just that I have to be in front of the Council at two and I had to floo to the kindergarten this morning and-” she launches into the story of how Rose tried to unionise the house elves at the kindergarten, which Hermione wholly supports of course but it is quite an ambitious task for a five year old. They nod and smile at their colleagues in the halls, reaching the canteen and sitting down at an empty table. Hermione continues talking about the latest Rose adventures and Harry runs his eyes over what is on offer today, and then taps his wand on the edge of his plate for number 3. The smell of the tikka masala hits his nose and his mouth waters instantly.

Hermione leans over her empty plate and sniffs the air delicately. Her face goes through multiple expressions, settling on unimpressed.

“Again, Harry?” she asks.

Harry shrugs and breaks off a big bit of his naan. Hermione rolls her eyes and taps her plate, making a little happy wiggle in her chair at her panini.

She takes a bite and then tells Harry about Ron who apparently came home with no hair yesterday. He and George were testing some new super secret thing for the shop which turned out not quite as they expected it to. George retained the hair on his head, but to the absolute delight of Ron, somehow lost all the other hair on his body, eyebrows and eyelashes included. Hermione swears there are pictures and Harry makes her promise to bring them tomorrow. Malfoy will get a kick out of those, Harry’s sure.

They wrap up lunch in record time and Harry is back in his office not twenty minutes after he left it. Ruth is not at her desk, having taken her lunch at her usual time as well, so Harry settles in his chair and starts on that research he promised Malfoy he would do today.

He notices the ache some indeterminate time later. He can’t say if it’s getting more intense or if the original tightness is just spreading further, but he cannot deny that something _is_ happening. It feels almost like that time Molly hugged him after he got back from an international mission and they haven’t heard anything from him in around two months. Harry still maintains she cracked his rib. Molly just swats at his arm and tuts.

He makes a note of the feeling and looks at the time to mark that down as well. While he cannot be cured, he can at least serve as another anonymous case study and maybe, one day in the future, someone will find a way to unravel the curse’s hold on. He knows that the Department of Mysteries is working on it, has been working on it for years now, actually, but due to the complexities and variations of the curse it is almost impossible to make headway. It took them years to find a subject cursed with the original Wasting Curse, only for the woman to die before she got to Britain. They got the Pensieve memories of the Healers who examined her in Spain, and the exact words the caster used from her memories, extracted before she passed. Still, they made little progress without being able to examine her in person. The curse dismantling process on one of the thousands of variations has been deemed futile for reasons Harry himself has a hard time following. Curse Breaking is one of the most difficult magical fields one could strive to study, and Harry never went above the bare minimum required of an Auror. Hermione, of course, chose it as her _second_ speciality, and assured Harry that the Head of Curse Breaking was very correct in choosing not to pursue the thousands of variations but only trying to focus on the original spell.

He sighs and presses his fingers into the inner corners of his eyes, removing his glasses and letting them dangle from his other hand.

He can’t tell her. And by extension, he can’t tell Ron, either, or any other Weasley, for that matter. He doesn’t know if they’ll ever forgive him, but he also knows that he is not willing to spend his last weeks in The Department of Mysteries, being poked and prodded, used as a test subject. Agatha is already documenting the progression of the curse and will have examined him exhaustively multiple times before he dies, so Harry just needs to settle this with his attorney, to make sure the handover of the data to DoM is done anonymously and is in no way linked to his death.

He realizes he forgot to contact Lloyd. He sends off a memo to Malfoy to please send him Beaste, if she is available.

He goes to the window and opens it, enjoying the fresh air and looking towards the left where Beaste usually emerges from. The sight of her always makes something inside Harry ache with the memory of Hedwig, even though Beaste could not look more different.

It must be the elegance with which they fly, he guesses. Hedwig was a controlled and elegant flier and Beaste is as well. She was a joy to watch when she got to hunt in the garden at the house.

She has a small piece of parchment in her beak and hands it over.

_I hear you owe her two treats now._

Harry chuckles and pets Beaste’s chest. “Two, is it now?”

She hoots and looks at him, waiting.

He brings her three, just because he can.

She hops on the stoop he keeps in his office in case she visits, and munches on the three bits of dried meat happily while Harry writes a letter to Lloyd, setting up a meeting for next week.

He sends her off and checks his schedule, deciding to go over the data he put down on paper to make sure it all tracks and he’s ready for tomorrow. The worst thing he could do is hand Malfoy incorrect information.

The pressure behind his sternum makes him resurface from his research what he realizes is hours later. Ruth is gone, in all likelihood already home, and the sun seems to have set when Harry wasn’t paying attention. Harry now, without a doubt, has enough research for the next three meetings at least, but knowing Malfoy, so does he.

He packs up, presses a hand to his chest, and chooses to walk home.

Not like he can be cursed _more._


	2. Chapter 2

Thursday morning report gets him an answer from Agatha, who thanks him for the detailed notes he’s sent yesterday evening and asks him if he could come see her Monday morning instead of Tuesday. Harry agrees, knowing very well that he will go in early enough that it will not clash with any of his meetings at work.

He copies the data he sent her into his own file, grabs his things and heads to the office via floo today, just to switch up his routine a little bit. When you’re eighteen, no one ever tells you that being an adult mostly consists of not knowing what to have for dinner, trying to figure out why you’re beyond sleep deprived and spending most of your work days in useless meetings that make you want to stab someone in the eye with a spoon. Harry’s way of dealing with this is to vary his routine. It’s a good safety measure and as a bonus, it allows him to tell the days apart.

Harry has had to count to ten four times before the last pre-lunch meeting is over and he is very proud of keeping his anger and frustrations in check. He’s been feeling the pressure in his chest throughout the entirety of the last meeting, which certainly did not help in keeping him calm in the face of Griffis’ unending droning about the budget. Harry cannot wait for the short reprieve lunch will provide. He will have to come back after, but at least he won’t have to listen to Griffis go on and on about how he thinks the doughnuts for the monthly Head Aurors’ meetings are a luxury the Ministry cannot afford. Harry shakes his head and rounds the last corner before the doors to Ruth’s office, and then his, come to view.

The first door is open, as it usually is, and Harry can already see that Malfoy is leaning against the wall right by his closed office door, pointedly ignoring Ruth, who seems to be watching him like a hawk.

“‘Mione went to get her things and will be waiting for us in the Atrium,” Harry says instead of an apology. Malfoy is aware he had a meeting with Griffis, who is known to always run at least fifteen minutes longer than originally scheduled. He loves the sound of his own voice and will not be stopped until he has said what he thinks everyone needs to hear.

Malfoy doesn’t say anything, watching him as he hands over the copy of a file Griffis gave to everyone at the meeting to Ruth. Harry can’t help but push his fingers into his sternum, the three sharp points of pain overriding the uncomfortable pressure that’s been getting progressively more pronounced. He breathes out and looks up at Malfoy, whose eyes are narrowed and focused on Harry’s fingers. Harry drops his hand.

“Ready?”

Hermione does not disappoint and brings the photo of bald Ron and hairless George, just as she promised. Malfoy chokes on his water when George wiggles his nonexistent eyebrows from the very well timed loop of the moving photo. Harry pats his back, trying to help clear his airway. His hand stays in place even after the coughing stops and Harry notices the unusual amount of color in Malfoy’s face, the way his eyes are shining with mirth. Harry can’t look away, knows that he has to. His palm lingering on Malfoy’s back is one thing, his eyes lingering on Malfoy’s face is another.

Hermione tucks the photos back into her purse and Harry turns back to his food, taking his hand away with reluctance, his fingers trailing across the warm back a little too slowly. Malfoy doesn’t comment, but he also doesn’t move away, doesn’t shy away from Harry’s touch. Harry tries not to read anything into that.

Lunch passes, and when Harry sits down in his office he notices that the pressure in his chest is not as pronounced as it was after the series of meetings. He makes a note of it, penning down a question to Agatha if maybe his own moods can influence the progression of the spell. He doesn’t think it likely, but he’s also hard pressed to draw any other conclusion. He’s been down that road before, daydreaming about Malfoy maybe returning his-- 

Point is, he’s been down that road before and it never led anywhere.

Draco, and Harry scarcely allows himself to call him that even in his own head, is a colleague and a friend. Harry has four, _maybe_ six, weeks to live and it would be beyond unfair of him to try and start anything with Draco now, even if he did think that Draco returned his feelings. Which he doesn’t. Think. Or return. Or both.

Harry deflates, sliding down in his chair, letting his head fall back.

There’s a water stain on his ceiling which wasn’t there last week. O’Lairy must have been experimenting in his office again. Harry spells it dry, just to make sure, and removes it with a handy spell he learned from Molly what feels like eons ago. 

After a couple more minutes of procrastinating, he goes over the Griffis file and makes annotations in the margins for when Griffis inevitably asks about some inconsequential detail mentioned in the footnotes. 

And so it goes. One would think your life would change after receiving news of your imminent demise, but Harry knows better. The Universe, the person in charge, whoever or whatever one may believe in - they don’t really care, or so he thinks. Life continues as it did before, with work and lunches and meetings and reports to Agatha and then the weekend finally comes and Harry is so incredibly glad for it. He’s exhausted, maybe because of the curse, maybe because of everything else, too. He isn’t willing to examine the feeling too closely to find out. He has dinner at Ron and ‘Mione’s on Friday evening and as always, supremely enjoys listening to Rose and her tales from kindergarten. 

Harry had never spent much time with children and was apprehensive of Rose at first, but the longer he knew her, the more he grew to love her. Unlike many other children Harry’s had the chance to meet, she’s had a personality from the moment she emerged into this world and her intelligence shone through her eyes even when she was a baby. She’s too clever for her own good and funny to boot.

Or so Harry thinks, but looking at ‘Mione’s exasperated expression makes him think he’s the only one appreciating that at this moment in time.

Harry wants to remind Hermione of the troll incident, or the Polyjuice one, but knows better than to do that. There is a time and a place to tell tales of their adventures, the more innocent ones and even the ones less so, and Rose is far too young to know any of them, Harry thinks. He probably won’t get a chance to tell her any of them himself, and the pang of regret that rings in his chest surprises him. He breathes through it, thinking how lucky he’s been to see as much of her life as he has.

Ron is watching him and Harry has the sudden thought that somehow he knows. Maybe it was his body language, or the way he zoned out multiple times since he arrived, or something else entirely, but Ron’s eyes are full of sadness and an unfathomable amount of understanding. He doesn’t say anything but gives Harry a small glum smile.

Harry’s throat feels tight and he’s never been happier to feel the alert for his diagnostic spell.

He excuses himself from the table and goes to the bathroom, casting the spells and then washing his face with cold water. It doesn’t have the desired effect and Harry feels as morose and tired as he did before. He sends his report to Agatha, noting that even while happy and relaxed - at least before he once again fell into his now very typical melancholy - the pressure behind his sternum and on his ribs did not abate.

After flooing home with leftovers in neat little boxes, Harry is beyond relieved when he remembers he didn’t make any plans for this weekend, that he has nothing scheduled until the checkup on Monday morning.

Leftovers tucked into his cold storage, Harry takes a long shower and falls into bed.

* 。 • ˚ ˚ ˛ ˚ ˛ • 。* 。° 。* 。 • ˚

Harry wakes up feeling shittier than he did when he went to bed. When he checks the time, his brain takes almost a full minute to process what the clock says. Has he been asleep for more than sixteen hours? He’s not hungry and he’s still so, so tired. He summons a glass of water and tries very hard not to think about the insistent pressure in his chest. His ribs feel compressed, his breathing is more than slightly restricted. The water makes him feel a little less dead and his brain registers the time again. Merlin, did he miss his morning check in with Agatha? He must have been sleeping so deeply that not even his wand vibrating under his pillow could wake him up. He goes over the diagnostic spells and sends Agatha a note explaining what happened. makes sure the data is copied in his own file and seriously considers falling back asleep.

He doesn’t. For lack of anything better to do he does go into the living room and starts working on their project. They still haven’t given it a name, wanting it to be something catchy but classy and easy to remember, which is hard to achieve with the scope of things they want to handle under one roof. IMLEA sounds awful, which is one thing both Harry and Malfoy are in agreement about.

He settles down with the notes from yesterday’s meeting with Malfoy and decides to go over everything he has from the beginning. He has the time, might as well be thorough.

He gets lost in the work, only the buzzing of his alert that his next check in is in five minutes bringing him back to the present. He takes stock of himself, of the tight pressure in his chest, makes a couple of notes and sends it through the floo.

Sunday passes in a similar fashion, with the pressure in his chest getting more _there_ every time Harry thinks about it, every time he tries to breathe a little too deeply. And while his idea to isolate himself for the weekend to sleep and do nothing but recharge might have had merit, it also very much failed. He wakes up on Monday morning and for the first time since being Cursed truly understands why this particular Curse got its moniker; he feels exactly like one might expect when wasting away. Putting his clothes on drains him of energy so completely that he sends Agatha a note asking her to allow him floo access directly to her office.

Her face goes from blank to slightly alarmed the instant Harry steps out of the floo.

“The reports didn’t indicate it was this bad, Harry,” she chides him, directing him to a chair with an arm on his shoulder. Harry falls into it gratefully, closing his eyes for a moment.

“I didn’t do much,” Harry tells her, out of breath, “but sit around and work on some reports, so I couldn’t judge my energy levels very accurately.”

She raises an eyebrow in disbelief and opens his chart, motioning for him to go on.

Harry gives her the rundown, keeping it as honest as he can. “It feels like the flu, but without the stuffy nose or fever. I’m tired and the pressure in my chest is starting to be quite uncomfortable. I can feel a headache coming in. I have to force myself to eat at least once a day.”

Agatha nods and starts running the diagnostics on him herself. She adds a couple more and finishes the set with one that seems to soothe the aches and pains, if only briefly.

She looks unhappy, and Harry’s sure he knows why.

“There is nothing I can give you that will soothe the effects of the Curse, Harry,” she tells him, voice tinged with genuine sorrow.

“I know.”

“It worries me that the progression has accelerated, and in such a short amount of time, too,” she mentions and goes back to his chart, flipping through the pages. “When I recalculated based on the data from last week, I was ready to tell you that I’ve misjudged the speed of the progression of the Curse, that it was a slow acting one and that you might have as much as four months, but with the numbers from this weekend, we are back to the original timeline, I’m afraid.” She looks up at him then, expression pinched.

“Oh,” Harry breathes. It’s true that he didn’t feel as bad for most of the work week. Tired, yes. And the pressure was always there, too, but it seemed to have been manageable, at least. Maybe, Harry thinks, he was right in thinking that his own emotions influence the Curse. It’s not like they know the precise wording of the one he was hit with.

There is nothing much either of them can say after that, really, but Harry does mention his intention of handing over the details and notes of his case, anonymously via Lloyd, to the DoM. Agatha doesn’t look surprised and assures him she will comply with his wishes and give Lloyd whatever data he needs, as long as it’s Harry’s wish.

Before he leaves, she tells him to call on her immediately if the Curse affects his breathing to the point where he feels like he can’t catch his breath even when seated or if the pain gets to be too much. She can’t rid him of the pain, she clarifies, but she can always knock him out for a period of time, if need be, to give his mind a break.

And maybe Harry didn’t fully understand all the implications of the Curse and the way it affects not just the body, but the mind. The fact that he might go mad from the unending pain before the Curse kills him never even occurred to him. Well, no point in dwelling on that now, Harry thinks, and shuffles to the floo.

Malfoy is sitting in his chair, legs on Harry’s desk, when Harry steps out of the floo in his office. There’s an extra tea waiting for him, this time in Harry’s work mug that says _this meeting could’ve been an email._ Most wizards don’t understand it, but those few who do shoot him a smile every time they see it.

“I thought our meeting wasn’t until nine?” Harry asks, sitting down in the visitor’s chair opposite Malfoy without complaint. Malfoy is watching him, his eyes running over Harry’s face and posture. Harry doesn’t have the energy to sit straight, to replace his exhausted expression with one slightly more work appropriate. Harry sighs, gathers his energy and leans forward to get his tea. The tea is very much worth the sharp pain just under his ribcage, Harry thinks as he sips the perfectly prepared brew. 

“And good morning to you too, Potter,” Malfoy says instead of commenting on whatever it is he’s seen in Harry’s expression. Looks like Malfoy’s decided to wait him out. The smile on Harry’s lips is involuntary and not one that Harry can stop or hide. Malfoy shoots him a quick smile in response and then taps open the file that is sitting on Harry’s desk.

“I had some free time on my hands this weekend--” Harry’s snort and the laughter that follows make Malfoy pause “-- what, Potter?”

“Oh, nothing, just,” Harry says and reaches into his bag to produce the fat file with numerous papers and notes sticking out of it. Malfoy’s eyes widen. Harry laughs and almost spills his tea. Workaholics, the both of them.

He feels much better after their meeting is concluded. They’ve planned out a two hour meeting each day for the next two weeks, although seeing how much work they’re both pouring into it, the presentation is bound to be ready much sooner than that. He might even live to see it be approved, Harry thinks with a bitter chuckle.

Some progress reports, courtesy of Ruth, appear on his desk and Harry starts going through them, feeling much more energetic than this morning. 

Must be the tea.

Lunch is an uplifting affair with both Ron and George present this time. Ron with his hair shorter than Harry has ever seen him wear it and George still basically lash- and eyebrow-less. On Mondays the shop doesn’t open until the early afternoon as both of the Weasley brothers insist that no one is ever in the mood to be trifled with on a Monday morning, and selling trickster potions and spells and such might lead to actual injuries. Harry just thinks they hate Monday mornings and enjoy the fact that they can start their week by having lunch with friends.

The days pass, much like they always have. Harry notices that he feels much better than he did during the weekend, but chooses to focus on the project and on trying to clean up some old files hanging in the limbo between a back burner case and a cold one.

On Wednesday evening Harry notices that the pressure seems to be returning with almost weekend-level vigour. Malfoy has cancelled their daily meeting due to an emergency court hearing he had to attend in person, which freed up Harry’s morning considerably. The pressure started intensifying right before lunch - a sandwich, which Harry ate alone in his office - and during the afternoon became so distracting that Harry couldn’t focus on his work anymore. He has a nagging feeling that he’s missing something, something obvious, too. He purses his lips and calls the file in which he’s been gathering copies of the reports he sends to Agatha. He hasn’t looked at it before. There is nothing he can do to change his fate which made the simple task of looking it over seem like a complete waste of time. Harry looks at the file in his lap and runs his fingers through his hair. Agatha has everything well in hand, there is no point in reading this, is there? He sighs, takes his glasses off and drags his hand down his face.

He opens the file and starts reading. 

* 。 • ˚ ˚ ˛ ˚ ˛ • 。* 。° 。* 。 • ˚

Harry is thirty five years old, will be thirty six this year actually, and while a lot of things could have been said about him at one point or another in his life, him not being self aware is no longer one of them. He _knows_ he’s oblivious. He _knows_ that he focuses on one thing to the exclusion of all else. But being an Auror and rising through the ranks to where he is, slowly and as organically as someone with his history can, has taught him a lot about himself and has also taught him how to compensate for some of his more glaring shortcomings. So while he might still not be the most observant person walking this Earth, he does have a very good memory, and even better - his own Pensieve. 

Harry ends up extracting most of his memories, or more precisely the ones that are even tangentially related to Malfoy since the time he’s been cursed, into small glass vials. He almost runs out of vials, which is no surprise, truly. The fact that all the memories are tinged with heartache and have a slightly bitter aftertaste isn’t either. What does surprise Harry is that underneath it all, the memories are imbued with a low hum of contentment and happiness.

Harry plunges himself into the first memory and the immediate difference between the levels of pressure-pain in his chest knocks his breath out. It’s a low level thing here, a nuisance at most. His past self still seems to unconsciously be pressing his fingers into the spot where the pain is originating from.

And then Malfoy shows up, bursting through his office door, and something in past-Harry’s face relaxes, ever so slightly.

Well, then.

Harry goes through the rest of the memories, noting how the Curse progresses as well as how it abates in Malfoy’s presence. If his hypothesis is correct - which, at this point, Harry is willing to bet his life on - then the Curse seems to be recognizing Malfoy as a potential ‘cure’.

There are so few documented cases of a Curse being broken that the literature has barely any idea as to how the breaking itself happens. Does it happen all at once at the first sign or possibility of the conditions of the Curse being fulfilled? Does the Curse have a fine print? Is it different for each variation? Harry has more questions than answers.

He looks at the clock, noticing it’s a little past eleven, and decides to risk it.

He tells his Patronus to find Agatha and have her Floo to his flat.

She shows up not a minute later wearing a fluffy midnight blue nightgown, thick socks and a fetching green face mask. Her hair is in a bun and she’s also wearing a headband to keep it out of her face, or more likely to keep it away from the mask.

“Harry!” she rushes to him, wand clutched in her casting hand, sparks already flying towards Harry’s body, pinging off of different parts of it.

“I’m alright,” Harry tells her and points to the sofa, “please, sit. I think I figured something out.”

She looks startled, then confused and a little angry, but deflates right after that. She’s just about to touch her forehead when she remembers and groans. Harry chuckles.

“What is it that you think you’ve figured out,” she flops down on the sofa, nightgown showing off her pyjama-clad legs. They have little dogs running around them and jumping over small fences. Harry watches the tiny dogs jump for a moment until he hears a throat clearing.

“I-- sorry, right,” Harry says, embarrassed, and then looks away, back at the floo, “I think there’s someone.” He can’t help the way his hand waves vaguely and then points to his chest. 

“You think-- Harry! Why didn’t you say so before!” She shoots up, as if ready to go fetch them right this moment.

“I didn’t know!” He fails at keeping the defensiveness out of his voice.

“How could you not-- but wait.” She sits back down, twirling her wand between her fingers, looking into the small fire still on in the floo. “That’s not- the Curse should have broken,” she says, voice confused, “or maybe-” and with a wave of her wand she summons numerous books that start opening, pages flying “- where is it, where have I read it-” she keeps waving her wand and mumbling at them until “- aha!” She shoves one particular book at Harry.

Turns out that what little has been documented supports Harry’s theory that each Curse is different, and each one is broken in a slightly different way. There is no clear precedent, Agatha agrees with him, but she also tells him not to be stupid and to talk to the person he suspects might be able to save him. Because the Curse has not yet been broken, she thinks it might break only if the person tells Harry how they feel... And their feelings satisfy the conditions of the Curse.

She insists on him sending readings twice a day and coming in on Monday unless he manages to break the Curse before then, in which case he is to come in as soon as possible. 

Then she gives him _a look_ and leaves, her fluffy robe fluttering and the tiny dogs still jumping over tiny fences on her pyjama bottoms.

Harry sits back down on his sofa and stares at the ceiling, one hand on his chest, trying to keep the pressure at bay.

* 。 • ˚ ˚ ˛ ˚ ˛ • 。* 。° 。* 。 • ˚

He gets into the office the next morning and realizes the epiphany he’s been hoping for will most probably not happen. Without any sort of a real plan, he wanders around his office for a bit, looking at it how an outsider might. It’s not ostentatious, there are no awards or anything like that on display anywhere. He thinks it looks cozy, if a little messy. The earthy tones in which it is decorated earned a raised eyebrow from Malfoy during his first visit, as if he expected Gryffindor reds and golds. Harry didn’t comment and Malfoy never asked. He doesn’t have a portrait of Snape or Dumbledore, which he supposes is another thing people might find surprising. The two paintings he does have are landscapes; one has roaming sheep and once in a while Harry gets to see the shepherd, too; the other one is of a farm with a porch where an old woman naps in her rocking chair and hills of green swaying grass hypnotize the viewer. 

Harry turns away from the paintings, facing the door of his office and the idea of Ruth, who is most probably already at work. He still has absolutely no plan on how to approach Malfoy and the whole awkward topic of him possibly having feelings for Harry, ones that at this time might prove life-saving. He doubts any more dawdling will help.

Ruth raises her eyebrows at him when he finally opens the door.

“Yes, boss?” she asks, voice sardonic.

“Malfoy should be here soon,” Harry tells her, trying to keep his nerves out of his voice, “send him right in?” At her nod and what Harry thinks is a mumbled _as if I could ever stop him,_ Harry continues. “And you can take the morning, if you want. I don’t think I’ll be needing you the rest of the day.”

She looks at him like he’s grown a second and then a third head.

“Shouldn’t I stay here if you plan on going out?” she asks, narrowing her eyes and examining Harry as if he’s not quite right. She reaches into a drawer and there’s something being flicked onto Harry’s face.

“What the-” Harry sputters, taking his glasses off and looking at the greenish globs of gel on it. “Oh dear Merlin, I’m not Polyjuiced!”

Ruth wides her eyes and draws her lips in, biting them, obviously trying to keep a laugh in. “Can’t be too careful, boss, can I.” She shrugs a little and hides her chuckle with a cough.

Harry rolls his eyes and waves her a hand at her. She’s right, if he and Malfoy do end up leaving the office, it would be better if she stayed in. He sighs, about to start rubbing his glasses against his shirt when Ruth spells them clean.

“Thank you,” he says quietly, “and thank you for staying today, and for all that you’ve done the past couple of weeks.”

She looks a little confused. “What _have_ I done?”

“I-” Harry pauses, “your job, mostly, I guess. But you’ve done it exceptionally well, and I’m not sure how often I tell you that.”

She snorts at that and raises one eyebrow. “Don’t tell me, just make sure it shows on my next paycheck.”

They both smile, but Harry makes a mental note to indeed make sure it does. Griffis and his budget cuts can go to hell.

He goes back into his office but can’t seem to focus on anything, his brain fixated on the conversation ahead. He’s biting his nail, trying to figure out the best way to bring the curse up, when Malfoy barges in. He’s ten minutes early and carrying two cups of tea and he’s talking before the door behind him even closes. His mere presence makes Harry relax, makes his breathing so much easier.

“I know you’ve been trying to not so subtly make me think that naming our new joint task force LION is a wonderful idea, but Potter, I will never,” he pauses to look at Harry, to make it really sink in just how much he means this, “ _never_ name a task force after your House mascot.”

Harry is watching him, enjoying how much more enjoyable it is to breathe without the intense pressure on his ribcage. He’s probably smiling like an idiot, too, or so the quizzical look on Malfoy’s face would have him believe.

“And good morning to you too,” Harry tells him, “would you prefer we name it HISS?”

Malfoy’s expression tells him he would not, but the smile Harry can see blossoming is worth the terrible joke. Malfoy indulges him by asking, “And how, pray tell, would we achieve that particular abbreviation?”

“Uhh,” Harry wracks his brain and then goes for it, “the Home and International Security Service?”

Malfoy looks at him, appalled. “That is the most horrible thing I have ever heard.”

“Hisssss,” Harry says, holding the s for longer than strictly necessary. Malfoy tries to hide a snort.

“Stop with the fake Parseltongue and drink your tea,” he tells him, levitating one of the cups over to Harry’s side of the table. Harry takes it gratefully and as always, the tea is made precisely the way he likes it.

Something about that fact, about the way Draco knows how he takes his tea and coffee _and_ somehow also always knows which one of the two beverages Harry would prefer at any given point in time makes Harry blurt out a low “I’ve been cursed.”

There is a beat of absolute silence. 

He’s not sure if either of them’s still breathing.

“You-” Malfoy stands up, looking stricken, _scared,_ “what, _when._ H- _Potter,_ what in Merlin’s balls!” His eyes are wide, oh so wide, and as scared as when he was a teenager trapped in a house not quite his own anymore, being asked to identify a schoolmate so that he could be slaughtered. But Harry can see his mind working, putting the pieces together. “Last week, Berry and St Mungo’s,” he says to himself, then looks up at Harry, “did they find the person responsible, what Curse is it, who’s your--”

“Malfoy, _Draco,_ stop,” Harry pleads quietly and stands up, too.

Draco stops talking and moving, simply stands in front of Harry’s large oak desk, looking small and lost. His mind, however, still seems to be connecting the dots. 

“Granger doesn’t know, does she?”

Harry’s silence is answer enough.

“Then why are you-” he stops himself this time, unable to finish the sentence. _Why are you telling me, if you haven’t told her, and Ron?_

Why indeed.

“It’s a form of the Wasting Curse,” Harry says and Draco spits out a french word, half turns away from Harry as if to hide his expression, hide the horror that’s written all over that pale, sharp, _lovely_ face. He only takes a couple of seconds to compose himself and then faces Harry again.

“Is there any possibility, any at all that-” he’s looking beyond Harry, through him.

Harry’s heart is pounding, he notices absently. He’s been wanting to- He’s loved this man for so long, sometimes he thinks maybe since the very beginning, but knows that’s not true. No, he fell in love slowly, over files and research and during tea breaks and over lunches and walks through the Ministry hallways. He knows that, but it still feels like something that must have been in him all along, dormant, waiting. It’s not a blazing fire, it’s not all-consuming, debilitating. It’s an ever-present low hum, soothing like a cat purring on your chest. It’s also an ache, a constant reminder that he is the only one feeling this way. Even so, Harry’s accepted that, accepted the fact that his love is not reciprocated, not in the way he wants it to be. Draco loves him as a friend, Harry thinks, and that is enough, that is more than enough. He’s accepted years ago that it would never be more than that.

He doesn’t dare hope, not even now, not even after seeing what his confession did to Draco.

Harry looks at him, braces himself, and says, “It’s a Lov-”

“No,” Draco interrupts him, his eyes wild. He seems to have abandoned his cup of tea and his hand, the one not in his pocket clenched around his wand, is shaking. So is his voice. 

“No, it can’t be a Love Variation, it _can’t._ You wouldn’t still be _cursed!_ _Everyone_ loves you!” The desperation in his voice claws at Harry’s chest, the pain more acute than anything the curse could ever hope to put him through.

Harry’s not sure how his legs are still holding him up when he can no longer feel them, but he walks around his desk to get closer to Draco anyway. Draco, who looks like a statue now, Harry thinks, his hand no longer shaking and his whole body frozen in place, unmoving.

“It’s never quite that simple, with magic, is it,” Harry says, his own voice coming out foreign sounding, too low, wrecked with a feeling he can’t name.

“You-” and he’s looking through Harry again, not at him, not in his eyes, “-how long?” His voice is eerily steady, _cold,_ and Harry thinks he must be in shock.

“I-”

“How _long,_ Potter!” and now he’s looking at Harry, making painful eye contact.

“A month,” Harry tells him and sees the word land like a physical blow. He reaches out, brushing his fingers against Draco’s hand, trying to get him to focus on Harry. His fingers connecting with Draco’s skin seem to be the final straw. 

Draco flinches away from him and disappears with a loud and final _crack!_

Harry is staring at the empty space where Draco stood not a second ago and can’t stop the string of curses that leaves his mouth. He went at it completely wrong, he shouldn’t have just blurted it out like that, he didn’t even explain anything, didn’t get the chance to- and what if Draco thinks that- what if he doesn’t understand- Harry has to-

Harry stops his brain from spiralling out of control with a shake of his head.

He needs to explain everything properly, before things get even uglier.

And he needs to do it immediately.

There aren’t many places Draco would think to go, especially not when he’s obviously distraught, or so Harry thinks. He takes a deep breath, a vague idea of a plan forming in his head.

He sends his Patronus to Margaret, letting her know Malfoy will not be back the rest of the day and to hold the fort, and then tells Ruth he has to run.

The crack of Apparition would make his ears ring if the act itself wasn’t making his entire body feel like it’s being squeezed in the fist of a troll and then turned inside out, before being forced through a keyhole only for the process to reverse itself. Harry’s never sure if the pros of Apparating outweigh the cons.

This time, _this time_ they one hundred percent do.

He appears right in front of Malfoy’s front door and is knocking on it before he’s even properly all there.

There’s no response.

Harry is considering casting a couple of, in this situation very much illegal, Auror spells when a Patronus appears. It’s a cat, a fluffy one with big, big eyes. It speaks in Agatha’s voice.

_A distraught Draco Malfoy just appeared at the Spell Damage floor._

Harry closes his eyes and hopes that Agatha’s keyed him into the wards of her office not only for floo, but for Apparition as well.

He’s standing in front of her fireplace with all his limbs still attached a second later.

“-cannot let the Chosen One die!” Draco is shouting, his hands gesticulating wildly. His wand must be holstered, and Agatha doesn’t look scared or intimidated. When Harry focuses on her, she looks sad, so very sad instead. Harry swallows. 

She looks at him, which prompts Draco to turn his head, too.

Agatha gets up from behind her desk.

“Harry,” she says, “Mr Malfoy.” She nods at them both and leaves her office. Harry can feel the layer of spells she puts on her door. He is beyond lucky she’s his Healer, beyond fortunate that she’s decided to stick with him through everything he’s put her through.

When Harry focuses back on Draco, it looks like all the life has drained out of him in the couple of seconds it took Agatha to leave.

“You’re dying,” he says, making eye contact with Harry as if hoping Harry would shake his head, confess that this has all been a terrible joke.

“Yes and no,” Harry tells him instead, and he can see Draco is about to interrupt him and keeps talking before he can, “please, Draco, let me explain?” Harry points to the two chairs in front of Agatha’s desk and Draco looks at him incredulously. Harry chuckles.

“Might as well sit down, don’t you think?”

Draco looks like he very much does not think sitting down will help anything right now, but follows Harry’s example and plants his butt in the nice plush chair. Harry notices that they have both pushed the chairs so that they’re facing each other. There’s a little bit of space between them, but not much. Harry could-

“Potter,” Draco spits his name like he used to back in school, and Harry is startled into looking up, at Draco, at his pinched expression.

“I-- yes,” Harry says, clears his throat, “I, uh, I’m cursed, but I think there’s someone who can break it?” Harry tells him, looking over Draco’s shoulder, unable to make eye contact now, to see if Draco is putting the pieces together. There’s a small _pop_ and Harry looks down and sees that Draco is wringing his hands so hard his knuckles are popping. 

He wants to reach out and stop him, and so he does. He keeps his fingers as gentle as he can, a barely there touch to the back of Draco’s hand.

Draco freezes.

Harry keeps his eyes firmly on their hands.

“You _think--”_ Draco says, voice incredulous, “you _think?_ What curse were you hit with, precisely.”

Harry thinks it should have been a question but it sounds more like a statement, like Draco is all out of caring about being proper.

“Agatha thinks it was the honest--”

There’s a noise that’s half-sob half-laugh and one of Draco’s hands disappears from under Harry’s. When Harry looks up, Draco is covering his mouth and his shoulders are shaking, eyes squeezed shut.

It takes Draco a moment, but he opens his eyes and lets his hand fall back down into his lap, this time covering Harry’s. His lashes are wet, but there’s a small smile on his lips. His fingers are gentle, running over the prominent scar on the back of Harry’s hand.

“Only you, Potter,” he says, his eyes a mix of resigned and hopeful. This time, Harry’s last name sounds like something precious, pronounced with care.

Harry raises his eyebrows, sitting up a little bit.

“Yeah?” Harry asks, voice full of hope.

Draco shakes his head, but he’s smiling almost full on now.

“An Honest Love curse,” Draco says, still looking at Harry, “is only broken if the cursed person is loved truly, deeply, with all their flaws. If the person who loves them honestly loves _them, as they are,_ and not just the _idea_ of them,” he pauses, shaking his head a little once more, “is that the curse, Harry?”

Harry squeezes Draco's fingers and nods.

“Well, then.” And his voice is quiet, his face striped of his usual mask of indifference, of the careful layers he usually has on to protect himself. Harry can see the emotions warring in the minute twitches of his lips, the slight widening of Draco’s eyes. Draco leans in a little bit and presses his fingers where Harry can feel the pressure of the Curse abating. He laughs, a little wet chuckle, and looks at Harry.

“The Boy Who Live Thrice,” he whispers, smiles at Harry, and adds, “I love you,” almost as an afterthought, as if he’s said it a million times, as if it wasn’t something groundbreaking, _life saving._

The effect is immediate and the sting of the Curse breaking makes Harry wince. Draco looks alarmed but Harry shakes his head, smiles, then laughs. He’s bringing Draco closer by his shirt, falling to his knees and dragging him down, too. There are arms around him, holding him tight, and he doesn’t understand why Draco’s shushing him, why he’s rubbing those strong beautiful hands down Harry’s back so insistently. 

Oh, Harry realizes. He’s not just shaking with relief. He tries to stop the sobs, tries to hold his breath and bury his face in Draco’s chest, but it has very little effect.

“Shh, you’re alright, Harry, it’s alright,” he hears and so he focuses on that voice and on the strong beat of the heart that’s right under his palm.

When he calms down, he notices the tension in Draco’s limbs.

“Should I call your healer back in?” Draco asks.

Harry shakes his head.

“I really think it would be-”

“I love you,” Harry tells him, looking up into his eyes. 

Draco breaks eye contact and tries to disentangle himself from Harry. “Come off it, Potter, we both know that’s not-”

“What, we both know that’s not true?” Harry says, not letting go of Draco’s hand. He won’t be Disapparating on him again, not now. And if he does, he’s bringing Harry with him.

Draco doesn’t say anything.

“You’re not cursed,” Harry says, “so there is no way for me to prove that I mean it, but, Draco,” he pauses, waits for Draco to look at him, however fleetingly, “I love you.”

Draco shakes his head the tiniest bit.

“I love your pointy _lovely_ face, you ass.”

Draco is still not looking at him properly, face turned away just so, but he’s clutching Harry’s hand right back.

“Do you hear me?” Harry asks.

Draco rolls his eyes a little, but nods.

“Do you _believe_ me?” Harry adds with a smirk, knowing he’s being obnoxious but unable to help himself. Draco might not, not yet, not fully. Harry understands that and vows to himself that he will do his best to make sure Draco never has to doubt it, can always believe that Harry loves him back.

“Oh do shut up, Potter,” Draco replies and gets back up, sits down in the chair and waves his wand to fix his clothes and get rid of the signs of crying on his face. Harry feels his eyes get less puffy and his nose is clear and his glasses don’t have smudges on them.

“Thank you.” He squeezes Draco’s hand and sends a Patronus out for Agatha.

* 。 • ˚ ˚ ˛ ˚ ˛ • 。* 。° 。* 。 • ˚

After Draco rejects the offer of using Agatha’s floo, telling her the one in his office is not connected to the floo network, Harry looks at him incredulously, takes his hand and with Draco’s reluctant nod, Apparates them to his flat.

Draco is looking around like he’s never seen the place before and Harry realizes that he _hasn’t._ He rarely invites anyone over, keeping this place to himself, the one thing that’s only his. He’s lived here for close to five years now and he’s not sure if it looks lived in enough.

He clears his throat. “It’s not much.”

It’s a small flat but something about it spoke to him from the first moment he set foot in it. It has this feeling about it, not like a home would have, but like a place where one hides, where one can rest undisturbed. It was exactly what Harry was looking for, back then, but looking at it now and watching Draco in his space, he thinks it might soon change. 

The fireplace in the corner roars to life and spits out a fat file in Harry’s direction. Draco catches it before Harry can.

“DoM?” he asks, showing Harry the way it’s addressed.

“Oh, right,” and Harry has no idea how to tell Draco that he was meticulously documenting his slow and steady decline, but he’s aware that they do need to talk. He sighs and moves to the sofa, feeling Draco on his heels.

“It’s an anonymised account of the progression of the curse,” he ends up saying, looking from the fire at Draco who seems to have dropped the file on the coffee table. He doesn’t say anything for a while and then looks at Harry.

“Have you even launched an investigation into who attacked you?”

Draco must read the response on his face before Harry even says anything because he throws his hands up. “Oh come on!”

“I looked at my memories from that night. They hit me from behind from far enough that my proximity alert spell did not detect them. Berry stayed on the scene after the mediwizards took me away and ran the standard series of spells. She found nothing.”

Draco still looks dissatisfied.

“You know as well as I do that these curses are almost impossible to trace unless there are witnesses or the caster comes forward on their own,” Harry tells him, trying to make him see reason.

“Yes, well, that doesn’t mean someone should be able to get away with cursing The Chosen One with what is basically an Unforgivable.” Anger is clouding his eyes, it’s etched in the lines of his face, in the tense set of his shoulders.

Harry doesn’t want to think about that, doesn’t want to get lost in his own anger.

“Tea?” he asks Draco and gets up before he has a chance to reply.

Draco follows him, watching him as he makes tea the muggle way. He looks hesitant, unsure of his place here, in Harry’s space. Harry knocks their shoulders together, sways into Draco, lets his body deflate, allows the tension to drain from his own shoulders. It’s nice to be finally able to succumb to the impulse to lean on someone, Harry thinks. And then Draco winds his arm around Harry’s shoulder, moves him a little until Harry’s fully enveloped in his arms and his face is pressed into Draco’s neck.

Harry puts his arms around Draco’s waist and when Draco doesn’t protest the gentle touch, adds a little bit more force to it, drawing him as close as he can get.

They will have to talk, Harry knows, but there’s time for that later.

“You know you’ll have to tell Hermione,” Draco says out of the blue, nuzzling his nose into Harry’s messy hair. His shoulders are shaking. Harry can _feel_ Draco laughing at him.

“Oh god,” Harry moans.

The curse didn’t kill him, but Hermione still might.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading <3 Kudos and comments always very welcome.


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